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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29173194">if i could have a second skin (i’d probably dress up in you)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/quarterdeck/pseuds/quarterdeck'>quarterdeck</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Eddie Kaspbrak Loves Richie Tozier, Eddie Kaspbrak’s God-Given Right to be a Husband, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Pet Names, Post-IT Chapter Two (2019), Richie Tozier Loves Eddie Kaspbrak, Tender Eddie yes this is a quarterdeck fic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 12:09:21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>17,649</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29173194</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/quarterdeck/pseuds/quarterdeck</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p><i>I want to marry you,</i> he thinks, words pounding in his head even as his mouth refuses to cooperate, wishing Richie could just read his thoughts. <i>I’m sorry. But I do. And I’m not brave enough to tell you.</i></p><p>If he loved him less, he might be able to talk about it more. Whoever said that was right.</p><p>***</p><p>Eddie wants to propose to Richie. Holy fucking Jesus, does he ever want to propose to Richie. </p><p>So why <i> can’t he.</i></p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>346</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>if i could have a second skin (i’d probably dress up in you)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>i have husband eddie brain worms&lt;3</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The thing about Eddie Kaspbrak’s life is that, from the very first moment of his existence, it’s always been just one unforeseeable tragedy away from being indistinguishable from a Shakespearean fucking play. </p><p>That’s not an exaggeration - his mother is <em> very </em> fond of telling the story of how, moments after he had been born, one irresponsible nurse had committed the unforgivable sin of offering him over to his father’s arms to hold for the first time. Somewhere between her arms and his, apparently, Eddie had squirmed and tumbled out of their hands onto the hard linoleum floor.</p><p>Eddie hadn’t even cried. He’d bounced back almost immediately, grinning gummily up at his father, but his mother had known from that moment on that nobody but her ought to be trusted with her son’s precious little life. </p><p>So there’s that.</p><p>The other thing he’s learnt over the years, this time about life in general, is that nobody can be expected to go about their lives happily and safely under the kind of circumstances that he has been forced to endure without experiencing some kind of psychotic break. </p><p>The clown is only the first example that comes to mind. </p><p>Sometimes Eddie thinks privately to himself that as terrible and lonely as their decades-long amnesia was, it may well have been the only thing keeping the seven of them alive. </p><p>What would they have done otherwise? Done their homework at the little desks in their room, spent late nights at the coffeeshop in college finishing up an essay, took the commute to work every day, always with the voice of Pennywise in the back of their head? That last sight of his liquified form slinking into the drain, the final dark laughing promise of <em> See you later, losers.  </em></p><p>Which doesn’t mean - obviously if given the choice, he would always have preferred to keep the memory of his friends. The lingering fear and painful memories of that night would have been a small price to pay to have kept his family around him, kept them close. </p><p>But still. There’s something to be said for the temporary relief of memories held at bay for long enough until you are forced to confront them again. </p><p>His mother was another example. Sometimes he thinks she’s a worse one. That revelation of the lies and placeboes she had so insidiously plagued him with his whole life had been desperately needed when it had come to him. Doing so may very well have given him the strength he needed to buoy himself along day by day in that household, kept him going until the day he had finally escaped her for good. </p><p>Had he continued operating under the steadfast belief of his multitudinous weaknesses and frailties, he doesn’t know how long he would have survived there, held so tightly under her thumb.</p><p>The list doesn’t end there. Childhood bullies, controlling spouses, phantom illnesses - they each had their place. Trials and tribulations were just one of those difficult yet unavoidable parts of life. But as far as Eddie has always been able to tell - what he’d always thought, truthfully, even when everything was going to hell in a handbasket - was that there was one thing in this whole world that made all of the grief and hardships bearable. And that’s another person.</p><p>Whatever the faults in their marriage, Eddie had witnessed the devolution of his mother’s mental state after his father had passed. He himself had been lucky enough to have Bill from his earliest memories, Richie and Stan only shortly after that, and he maintains to this day that those attachments had gone a long way in shaping who he had become, cancelling out, or more generously perhaps just counteracting, the influence of his home life. </p><p>Crawling into those sewers had only ever been doable because he’d had Bill on his right and Richie on his left. When the suffocating environment of his house had become too much to bear, he’d always been able to slip out the front door and pedal over to the clubhouse to find one of them there, bright grin and open arms. And hell - the very reason they’d all bonded together so quickly in the first place was their being united in being ruthlessly tormented by Bowers’ gang. </p><p>The Losers could say that he was brave until they were blue in the face, but Eddie knows the truth. It’s only ever been worth it when they needed him to be. </p><p>And that’s exactly why, without the memory of his best friends (and one specific person in particular), Eddie had clung so desperately to the nearest possible approximation of intimacy, with no ability to ever figure out why it had always felt so lacking. </p><p>That’s what it all came down to in the end. Nothing and nobody, Eddie had always thought, should have to be alone. </p><p>Years later, Eddie will think that this foundational belief was probably the root of it all. It’s no wonder that, now that he was past all of the danger and uncertainty of his past, now that he was living freely and happily in California, it still felt like something at the core was missing.</p><p>He’d had no chance at all. Wanting to marry Richie was an impulse ingrained down to his bone marrow from day fucking one.</p><p>
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</p><p>****</p><p>
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</p><p>“Eds!” Richie calls from the kitchen. “Whaddaya want for dinner? We’re dining at Café a la Tozier tonight!”</p><p>Eddie very nearly responds <em> Your face, </em>but manages to stop himself just in time. </p><p>It’s just one of many narrow slip-ups from the past couple of months, but he feels comfortable blaming this particular instance of momentary insanity on the fact that he’s been lying with his head upside down off the end of the couch for the past twenty minutes, and that his blood pressure (and thus, good judgement and critical thinking) has consequently been driven through the roof. </p><p>He even pretends that he believes it. </p><p>“Spaghetti Bolognese!” he calls back instead. It’s been a slow few weeks in the writer’s room of whatever secret dramedy project Richie’s been working on with Bill, and he’s been moping around the house for days now as if creative inspiration is going to be found clinging to the dust coating their window blinds. </p><p>At least this way he can have an easy hour of making his favourite joke to his heart's content. And however much Eddie might pretend to get exasperated with it all - his lot in life since the tender age of five, can’t change it now - sue him. He does like to find excuses to make the man happy. </p><p><em> A particular trait</em>, he thinks bitterly, <em> that frankly would make him a kickass fucking husband to Richie. </em>If he could just fucking <em> get </em> to that point. </p><p>And as he hears Richie’s affirmative hum, he allows himself a moment to wallow in an imaginary world in which that really does get to be his everyday reality; a piece of paper stowed away safely with their combined names set in permanent ink, and a matching set of gold bands on their fingers. </p><p>In that world, when Richie hands him his lunch in the mornings, the hidden notes would have tiny little scrawled hearts in the corner instead of just a messy <em> x Rich </em> on his more lucky days, and when Eddie tiptoes into the home office to shake Richie awake from yet another uncomfortable all-nighter, he can do so with a kiss pressed to his forehead, lead him into their shared room via linked fingers where he can rub gentle circles onto his back and make sure he gets a full night's sleep. </p><p>Content. Just absolutely delirious with happiness. Completely fulfilled. </p><p>Because that’s the crux of the matter, isn’t it? The burning desire that’s been keeping him awake at night, the identical wildest dream of both his thirteen year-old and forty year-old self, the reason he’s been hanging upside down on this couch like a fucking vampire bat for the last hour, despite the uncomfortability of the position and the admittedly undeniable health drawbacks. </p><p>Well. That, and he’s been trying to wean himself off his unhealthier hypochondriac tendencies a bit since Derry 2.0 and a renewed understanding of which of his issues, exactly, were real, and which were simply lingering products of his traumatic upbringing. </p><p>But mostly the other thing.  </p><p>God, Eddie wants to marry Richie <em> so badly</em>. </p><p>Like, really, fucking badly. It exists as a constant physical ache in his chest, a companion to his every waking moment of every single day. It’s honestly a little shocking, considering how little he’d enjoyed being married the first time around. Useful for tax benefits, sure, and convenient enough if either one of them were ever to get into an accident, even if the paralyzing fear of that had always overshadowed the actual likelihood of it occurring. It had lessened the amount of grief he’d gotten from his mother about it over the years, and provided an easy enough topic for shallow conversation with nosy coworkers. </p><p>But it wasn’t as if Eddie had entered into the bond out of any sort of feelings of love and tenderness, the way he’s pretty sure you’re supposed to. </p><p>He hadn’t even <em> been </em> the driving force in his marriage with Myra. He just hadn’t offered any resistance when she’d eventually laid out all the reasons why it was a practical idea - hell, prior to her bringing it up, it had never even been a thought in his head. All he’d had to do was get himself there on the day, and even that cab ride to the venue existed as an undetailed blur in his mind’s eye. </p><p>With Richie, it’s not the same at all. </p><p>Not only are the reasons behind the impulse worlds apart - talk about love and tenderness, holy <em> shit </em> - but it's become an all-consuming, burning desire within him, a thought driving him to distraction on a near-daily basis. He can hardly concentrate on making a sandwich for the thought of getting a ring on that man’s finger, for God’s sake. </p><p>Forget practicality, too. The first time the thought of marrying him had come to his mind, it wasn’t because he needed the financial security - he’s comfortable enough on his own there, even after divorce proceedings. It wasn’t even after he’d woken up in the hospital bed, Richie’s exhausted form stationed beside him with dark purple circles under his eyes and a wan smile that spoke of how difficult it had been just to get the nurses to allow him to stay there overnight. </p><p>No, the first time Eddie had thought about marrying Richie - in his adult life, that is, and not just the secret, furtive imaginings of his younger self, dared only to consider alone and in the dead of night - was when the six of them had been sitting around the table at the Jade of the Orient, nerves shot but something hopeful blooming in each one of their chests. </p><p>He doesn’t even know <em> why </em> he’d thought of it. He’d only known Richie again for about two hours, at that point. But with Richie’s big, strong hand gripping his own for their impromptu arm-wrestling contest, Eddie had taken one look at those unadorned fingers and thought <em> Oh. Gold would look nice against his skin, wouldn’t it.  </em></p><p>A thought that had startled him enough that his grip faltered for a fraction of a second, just long enough for Richie to slam his arm down against the table, crowing triumphantly and ignoring his flustered shouts about how he just hadn’t been ready, shut <em> up </em> you dickhead, give me another go!</p><p>Eddie’s own wedding band at the time had been a cool silver, the brutal starkness of the metal cold and unappealing to his eye. Not that it mattered. It’s not like he had cared too much when it had come time for him to choose it. But still, he liked to think that next time, given the choice and with all of his genuine and earnest care being put into it, he’d choose something quite different. </p><p>He tries not to think too hard about what he hoped in his own head by <em> the next time</em>.</p><p>Balmy summer night, 11:00pm at their hometown Chinese restaurant with six beloved strangers at his elbows. That had only been the beginning of the whole ordeal.</p><p>And on the surface, sure, it doesn’t seem like such a big problem. You love somebody, you think about marrying them, you either wise up and do it, or pussy out and live with the consequences. Not exactly a novel problem. Eddie Kaspbrak didn’t invent proposal anxiety. </p><p>When you dig a little deeper, however, that’s when things start to get really dicey.</p><p>First of all, Eddie doesn’t know how Richie feels about the idea of marriage. He knows that he’d seemed delighted enough learning about Stan and Patty’s after they’d headed to Georgia to visit the two of them on the way back from Maine, even complaining loudly and often about how he hadn’t been able to stand in as Stan’s best man. And he’s never explicitly said anything <em> against </em> marriage as a concept. But he’s never brought up the topic as it would ever potentially relate to himself either, and none of that automatically means that <em> he himself </em>would want to get married, anyway. </p><p>Or that he’d want to marry Eddie, even, given the choice of anybody in the whole world. </p><p>Second, and this one feels even more insurmountable than the first: Eddie doesn’t know how good of a husband he would be if they did get married. </p><p>It’s - the thought scares him, given how invested he is in success here. Because it goes without saying that Richie would be the perfect husband, doesn’t it. Eddie <em> already </em> finds him ideal in all ways, and they're not even  close to married. Richie is thoughtful, funny, handsome, kind, selfless - the examples are without end. </p><p>But Eddie’s precedent as a husband wasn’t exactly great on paper, and he knows that he’s a difficult character on top of even that; difficult and prickly on a good day, impossible enough on a bad one. Thoughtless and acerbic. Paranoid. Anxious. Less by far than what Richie deserves in a spouse.</p><p>So that’s something else to contend with. </p><p>Third point, and this one is absolutely crucial: the two of them aren’t even together.</p><p>That one just might be the most difficult to overcome. <em> Difficult</em>, but not impossible. He hasn’t allowed himself to worry about the consequences of it just yet.</p><p>Some might say there are other, better ways to go about it, when you’re in love with someone the way he is Richie. Some have! (Ben kindly, Bev rudely; he hasn’t consulted any of the others except for Mike on it yet, and he’d only laughed for five minutes straight before saying simply “Yes.” and hanging up). To confess, as a start, and then to date after that. Build up to marriage as all tradition and common sense typically dictates.</p><p><em> Date </em> Richie. That had been their sage advice. Just tell him that you’re in love with him and be together for a bit. If you want to marry him, that’s great, really, it is! Just save it for the right moment, let it linger a little. Give it time to settle.</p><p>His fucking ass, would the two of them date each other. The very <em> idea </em> of it. </p><p>He doesn’t want the - the uncertainty, the ambiguity, the goddamn childish <em> flimsiness </em> of dating. He doesn’t want to introduce him as <em> Oh this is Richie, my boyfriend, yes we’ve been dating for awhile now</em>. As if that word is in any way adequate to encompass all of the myriad deep and vicious feelings he holds for the man, present in his chest at every moment. </p><p>Christ, the very thought that people might look at them together and think shit like, <em> Oh, that’s cute. It’s so nice that they like each other so much. I hope they work out. They make a great couple.  </em></p><p>The fucking audacity. </p><p><em> Like </em> him? <em> Like </em> Richie Tozier? Maybe in fucking kindergarten he’d <em> liked </em> him, laughing shrieks getting the two of them in trouble as the boy would pull a face at him from across the table, sticking markers in his nose like a walrus. Yeah, he liked him then. But it’s been almost forty years and Eddie Kaspbrak is a long way past <em> like</em>. </p><p>Truly. If someone looked at him and thought <em>Eddie Kaspbrak.</em> <em>Now there’s a man who likes Richie Tozier</em>, Eddie thinks he’d snap a desk in half. </p><p>He’s in love with him. Which is - yeah. Great. The problem is that there isn’t a word in this world that he feels is adequate to describe them - or, at least not from Eddie’s end. </p><p>Roommates, <em> ugh, </em>stab him in the fucking eye. Friends would be a laughable simplification. Richie <em> is </em> his best friend, without a doubt, but that word isn’t enough either. Boyfriend has already been rejected, and isn’t even true regardless.</p><p>Soulmates. That’s not a bad one. But as the state doesn’t recognize that as a legally binding relationship designation, that’s out the window too.  </p><p>Of all the options allowed, husband comes closest. And as there hasn’t yet been a better word invented, it was just going to have to do.</p><p>Well, it would have to do <em> if </em> he gets up the courage to actually ask and <em> if </em> Richie says yes. That’s the greatest risk of all. That Eddie never gets brave enough to even get to that point, and that for the rest of his life he keeps the desire tucked quietly into his heart where it can’t be seen, or judged, or picked apart.</p><p>“Spaghetti-monster!” Richie calls from the kitchen, interrupting these thoughts. “Allons-y, mon chou. Es la hora de la cena.”</p><p>“You’re mixing up your languages!” Eddie calls back, heaving himself off of the floor and untangling himself from the pretzel he’d twisted himself into. “And neither of those were even Italian, you fucking disgrace.”</p><p>But the interruption has done its job. And as the blood rushes back to his head as he rights himself, he begins to feel a little better about the whole idea.</p><p>The ghosts of Derry have their power still, but even they seem further away with every passing day. Eddie isn’t scared of them anymore, or at least not like he was. The Trackers may not have been able to walk proudly hand-in-hand down Kansas Street, call themselves husbands with unapologetic pride and without fear of the inevitable backlash. But there’s nothing stopping Eddie from donning his silly little baseball uniform on the weekends that him and some coworkers head out to the park to play a few scrimmage rounds, and blow a proud kiss over to the stands where Richie always unfailingly sits, hooting and hollering at every single one of his home runs and keeping guard over the tub of fruit that he always cuts up to bring along for the team. </p><p>He’s <em> lucky</em>. That he can do that, and that the only thing stopping him these days is his own fear and doubts. He’s so fucking lucky to be alive and healthy and here with Richie. He’s so lucky to be in love. </p><p>And, you know. That’s something that Richie deserves to hear. </p><p>
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</p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>From his newly-huddled position behind the old chain-link fence, five year-old Eddie Kaspbrak cries, great big shuddering gulps as sticky red blood runs down his leg to stain the pristine white top of his socks. </p><p>One of the older kids on the playground had just shoved at him meanly, laughing at the little bag he keeps clipped around his waist to hold all of his medicines, and the impact of the gravel on his uncovered knees had scraped them raw. Kids like that don’t usually bother him at recess, quiet and quick as Eddie is usually able to be, but Bill was at home sick today and he guesses his lone stature hovering at the edge of the playground was just too easy of a target for them to pass up. </p><p>He sniffles again. His mommy is going to be so mad. </p><p>“Hey pal, you okay?” a voice calls from behind him, a kid his own age dropping down beside him with an audible <em> whomp. </em>He’s a bit funny-looking, big glass lenses like bug eyes dwarfing almost his whole face and fluffy curls sticking up in every direction. There’s magic marker all over his face.</p><p>But his grin is toothy and friendly, and when he sticks out his hand for a shake, Eddie doesn’t even think about all the stuff his mom has drilled into his head about germs and bacteria and dirty kids before he’s reaching right back to grasp it tightly. </p><p>“I’m Richie,” the kid says, still grinning wide. “I saw Henry shove you over and wanted to see if you were okay.”</p><p>“Um, my name’s Eddie,” Eddie says, sniffling when he glances up shyly to give a small smile back. “Yeah, he, um. Made my leg bleed.”</p><p>“Man, what a <em> jerk!</em>” Richie exclaims, and Eddie startles a bit at the volume, and at the forbidden word. He’d be grounded for a <em> week </em> if he said something like that at home. “But don’t worry, it’s not your fault. He does that to me and Stan all the time and- oh, that’s Stan over there! He’s my friend.”</p><p>Eddie follows Richie’s pointing finger to the sight of another boy sitting on the raised concrete bench by the playground, swinging his legs and flipping carefully through a book perched on his lap. At Richie’s call, he raises his head to give the two of them a wave, and Eddie waves shyly back. </p><p>“Anyhow, do you want some help with that?” Richie says, gesturing to the blood still trickling steadily down his leg. He pulls out a handful of clean-looking tissues from his pocket, and presents them to him almost proudly. Eddie looks a bit dubiously at the crumpled-looking paper, but he accepts the raised eyebrow offering with a small nod, wincing when even Richie’s gentle mopping at the wound causes his leg to sting painfully. </p><p>They don’t talk as he works. Or - at least he doesn’t. It doesn’t seem like Richie’s actually <em> able </em> to stop chattering, but the words provide an anchoring undercurrent to Eddie’s own lingering fear and upset. </p><p>After a couple minutes of this, Richie sits back on his heels to examine his work. </p><p>“There!” Richie exclaims, toothy grin returning as he looks back up at Eddie. “All better. Just needs a bandaid and then you’ll be <em> right as rain! </em> That’s what my dad always says to me when I get a cut, and trust me, I’m always running into things.”</p><p>He gestures self-explanatorily to his enormous glasses, shoving them absently up by the bridge when they fall down. </p><p>“Oh, I, um, I don’t have any bandaids,” Eddie says, feeling a little ashamed at this uncharacteristic oversight without really knowing why. He guesses he just doesn’t want this boy to think he’s careless, or stupid, or something. “I’m not supposed to play games that could hurt me so I - I only have my pills instead.”</p><p>“Oh. Well that’s okay, I can just kiss it better!” </p><p>And Richie leans forward to do exactly that, when Eddie jerks back in surprise. </p><p>“Um,” Eddie says, eyes wide. “My mommy says you can only give a kiss to someone when you’re married? But, um. Thank you anyway.”</p><p>Richie screws his face up in confusion. “I don’t think that’s true? My mom and dad kiss me better all the time when I get hurt. And when Stan’s arm got scratched up by the old alleycat last week, I kissed it too, and he said he felt better after that.”</p><p>But Eddie still feels unsure. He doesn’t think that Richie’s lying to him, but his mom <em> did </em> say that to him, and he knows she’s really good at keeping him safe.</p><p>Richie sees this, and just smiles easily. </p><p>“But if you’re worried about it, how about if I just get a bandaid from Stan? He always carries them around for me.”</p><p>Eddie nods silently at this, but can’t help feeling a little bereft when the boy scrambles away to do just that. He doesn’t want to disobey his mom, but. Well, Richie had said that it would make him feel better, and his leg <em> stings</em>. </p><p>When he returns, Eddie sticks his leg out and Richie opens the bandages messily, shoving the leftover crinkly paper into his pocket and smoothing the fabric carefully over his knee with concentrating tongue sticking out the side of his mouth. </p><p>Eddie thinks that’s going to be the end of it, that the boy will tell him goodbye and run back over to Stan now that he’s been patched up. But when Richie sits back, he’s looking thoughtful instead, frowning a bit when Eddie winces at the continued pain. </p><p>He doesn’t look like he’s finished a job well done. He looks like when you’re just about to get the last piece of lego onto your model, when you drop the whole thing and it shatters apart again at hitting the floor. </p><p>“Well…what about if I promise to marry you someday?” he says, eyes flickering between the brown bandages covering his knee and Eddie’s surprised eyes. “That way I can give you a kiss to help you feel better now, and it’ll still be okay.”</p><p>A happy giddiness bubbles up in Eddie’s stomach suddenly, and he grins back widely at Richie for the first time since the boy had come to sit next to him. He bobs his head up and down quickly, laughing at the smile he gets in return. </p><p>He can’t help but think about just how smart he is to have thought of that. </p><p>So Richie does, leaning forward to press his lips very carefully to the smooth fabric bandages, left then right. And he <em> was </em> right. It does make the hurt feel better. </p><p>Wow.</p><p>“Now c’mon,” Richie says, standing up and wiggling his fingers out at Eddie. “You gotta help me convince Stan to drop the book and come play tag with us.”</p><p>Eddie reaches out slowly, grabbing the hand in front of him. He doesn’t know why, but something about the decision feels like when you fit the last puzzle piece into place and just for a moment, everything in the world feels perfectly right. </p><p>
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</p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>One thing is clear, at least. If he wants to propose, he’s going to need a ring. </p><p>He already has one, technically. And it’s not his old wedding ring; that one he’d thrown shamelessly out the window as soon as he and Richie had driven out of Derry’s town limits, leaving the polished metal to lie in the dirt and mud of nowhere-Maine, exactly where it belonged. </p><p>But he does have his dad’s old wedding ring still in his possession, the old burnished band having passed down to him sometime after his mother’s death. He’d always assumed that someday he’d use it. </p><p>He hadn’t with Myra. </p><p>Something about it hadn’t felt right at the time. Not to mention that, well, - there really hadn’t been a proposal at all in that relationship at all. Just dating one day, and married the next, him swept along in the current as if watching from behind a glass with no say in the matter and no ability to change the outcome. Myra and his mother had handled that well enough on their own. </p><p>But even as he sits here on his bed and studies it now, turning it over and over in his hands, something doesn’t feel right about the choice this time around either. He doesn’t even really <em> want </em> to use the ring that his father had worn married to his mother. Doesn’t want to bring that kind of energy into whatever it is that he’s trying to do here with Richie.</p><p>Richie deserves more than a secondhand relic of a broken relationship that should never have happened in the first place. And while his man obviously isn’t one who values the most new and expensive things in life, that doesn’t mean that he doesn’t deserve more than a modicum of thoughtfulness and care to be put into such an important decision.</p><p>Yes, that’s exactly it, Eddie thinks decisively. He’ll get him a ring. But it won’t be secondhand, and it won’t be some random, careless choice made out of indecision.</p><p>Two hours of research later has Eddie staring at the brightly lit homepage of a jeweller who specializes in custom engagement pieces, each one a unique piece of art. </p><p>A smile pulls at his lips. Eddie cracks his knuckles. He begins ticking boxes. </p><p>
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</p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>Before even that, though, he needs to figure out how Richie <em> feels </em> about marriage. </p><p>He decides to strike that night at dinner. There’s no point waiting around twiddling his fucking thumbs, and the atmopshere is easy this way, Richie at the stove keeping an eye on a boiling pot of soup, him perched at the kitchen island on vegetable chopping duty. The most it’s safe to trust him with when it comes to food prep.</p><p>They’d discovered <em> that </em> pretty quickly after he’d moved in. </p><p>Richie is doing his best to teach him, but it’s been slow going so far. Eddie’s starting to think that even without being crippled by people who hadn’t thought him capable of so much as holding a butter knife in his life, cooking just probably wouldn’t be his forte. </p><p>“Hey Rich,” he tries now, voice even and casual, despite the way his heart is hammering in his chest. </p><p>Richie doesn’t hear him at first, humming under his breath to the low sounds of Billy Joel coming from the Spotify playlist on his phone hooked up to some round little speakers on the marble counter. His hips are bopping back and forth, and he looks - a little ridiculous. Mostly endearing.</p><p>He tries again.</p><p>“Wh- oh sorry, Eddie baby,” Richie says this time, startling a bit and craning his head a bit to look at him while still keeping an eye on the pot he’s stirring. “I was in the zone. What can I do for you?”</p><p>“No, no worries,” Eddie says quickly, brushing Richie’s inattention off in what is a suspicious enough move on its own. He hurries to speak before Richie can think too much about how he let him off the hook so easily. “I was just wondering, uh. You know. What you think of Stan and Patty’s relationship.”</p><p>At this, Richie jolts a bit, turning more fully to face the island.</p><p>There’s a beat of silence between them. </p><p>“What I think...of Stan and Patty’s relationship?” he repeats, brow furrowed. “<em>Why?”</em></p><p>Oh, goddamn.</p><p>“Their marriage,” Eddie clarifies quickly. “I guess I just wanted to know, uh. How you feel about it, you know.”</p><p>“Uhh,” Richie says slowly, hand holding the wooden spoon slowing down alongside it almost unconsciously. “I think it’s great? I mean, I love Pats. You know that.”</p><p>Well, that’s true enough. He’ll never forget the gleeful look on Richie’s face when they’d gone to visit them in Georgia on their way home from Derry, and Richie’s shout of “Stanley Urine! Stan the <em> Man!</em>” whilst exiting the car had been met with a smug grin and an “Actually, it’s Stan Blum now.” Poor Patty had gotten a crash course in meeting Richie Tozier, her first impression of the man after stepping out on the porch being his delighted, “You’re a wife guy! Eds, he’s a fucking wife guy, what a man!”</p><p>He’d boldly refrained from letting Richie know that his own <em> wife guy </em> was right there within his fucking reach, not to mention his immediate goddamn line of sight. </p><p>And anyway, Eddie hadn’t meant to make it sound like he was doubting Richie’s support for them - really, <em> Stan </em> of all people. As if that were a relationship that would ever be in danger. </p><p>And that’s not bitter! It’s not, he thinks it's great that the two of them have such a strong relationship. It must be so nice to be privy to all of Richie’s secrets! Must make things like surprises and uncertainties so easy. So stress-free. </p><p>“Or - or Ben and Bev, even,” Eddie gives that up for lost and tries next, still striving to sound casual and easy as his hands work methodically through the motions of chopping up the peppers. “If they were to ever get married. What, uh. What you would think of that.”</p><p>Ugh. Putting it that way sounds even more stupid, with no obvious good reason behind his asking, but he’s too far into it to possibly back out <em> now</em>. </p><p>He studiously avoids Richie’s gaze burning on the back of his neck, but he’s always been shit at feigning indifference. Eddie is a man who runs between extremes: either absolute obsession or complete detachment, and Richie knows that better than anyone. </p><p>“But<em> why</em>?” Richie asks, face screwed up in abject confusion. “Are you looking to be one of their thirds or something? Because I’ll be honest with you Eds, I don’t think Ben could handle you.”</p><p>“Wh-<em> no!</em>” Eddie shrieks, so taken aback by this interpretation that he abandons the task in front of him entirely, whirling around to face Richie with hands on his hips. “What are you even talking about you fucking jackass, their <em> third</em>. Jesus.”</p><p>He doesn’t say anything to the effect of <em> I want </em> you <em> to handle me you fucking dingus, </em>or, <em> If anybody were to be anybody’s third, wouldn’t it be you with Stan and Patty? </em> because he feels healthy, normal emotions about certain friends of theirs who are able to be honest and open with Richie about their feelings and thus reap the benefits of that in turn. </p><p>Richie raises his eyebrows, throwing his hands up as if to say <em> Well then?? </em></p><p>“I was just <em> wondering.” </em>Eddie huffs, turning away again with a scowl at a mission failed. </p><p>Richie narrows his eyes at him.</p><p>“Wonder about something a little less suspicious, Agent K,” is all he says. </p><p>And it’s left at that. </p><p> </p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>Tonight, for a change, Eddie has neither the mental headspace nor the time to worry about all of the anxieties that come hand-in-hand with the idea of proposing to Richie. </p><p>It would make a nice change, except for that unfortunately that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have other, equally pressing things to worry about in its place. </p><p>“Oh no, no, <em> no,” </em>Eddie now panics out loud, whirling around the kitchen to frantically search for what he needs, heart sinking lower and lower as he finds nothing on each successive pass around. “No, no, no, no <em> no!</em>”</p><p>Sparkling white countertops are covered with four empty wine glasses, and dishcloth-covered plates of food, the stove turned off and wiped down, and an album he’d borrowed from his guest tonight sitting by the table, ready to be returned. Almost everything is just as it should be. But <em> almost </em> is the key word, and the one small detail he hadn’t thought of is the one sticking in his head like an angry gnat. </p><p>The gravel driveway outside the house warns of a car pulling up, and he hears the front door of the house <em> snick </em> open with heavy footfalls kicking off shoes, but he’s barely aware of the significance, still lazer-focused on on the tauntingly empty tabletop in front of him. </p><p>“What’s the story, morning glory?” a voice calls from the hall, and even as the footfalls grow closer, he doesn’t turn around to greet him as he normally would. </p><p>“It’s the fucking centrepiece, Rich!” he says instead, hands shooting up to tug stressfully at his hair. He hears something being placed on the counter behind him, and bigger, warmer hands coming up to gently extricate his own grip from the chestnut strands and keep them down at his sides. The pain on his scalp lessens, but not the one still lurking behind his eyes. “Remember, you know how I was talking about those flowers that she likes? I forgot the <em> centrepiece.</em>”</p><p>He whirls around to face Richie, devastated, but even in his panic has to take a moment to stop and allow himself to be shattered and remade by the sight of him.</p><p>Richie had clearly dressed up for the occasion, a dark maroon sweater fitted nicely to his chest and plain black jeans with a brown belt on the bottom. The tonal monotony of the look would have been stunningly out of character, were it not for the hightop sneakers on his feet that Bev had handmade for him, fabric a repeating print of what looks to be some truly godawful wallpaper from the 1970s.  </p><p>Despite everything, it makes Eddie’s heart skip a beat. He knows Richie only did it because he knew this night was important to Eddie; that he himself couldn't care less about situation-appropriate attire, however many red carpets he’s been forced to walk over the years. </p><p>Yes. Back to the situation. </p><p>“Mandy and her wife are going to be here soon, and I forgot to get something for the table!” Eddie says frantically, hands only kept still by the way that Richie still hasn’t let go of them, and his own selfish unwillingness to bring that fact to attention. “Like a fucking <em> idiot, </em>now they’re gonna - gonna think I don’t know how to host a dinner or something!”</p><p>Richie doesn’t say anything immediately, studying Eddie thoughtfully from where he stands a few inches apart from him, despite the tight clasping of their hands. If Eddie were a hopeful man, he might speculate that it was the clasping of the hands itself that was causing Richie’s brain the need to recalibrate. Fuck knows it’s doing a number on him. </p><p>But Eddie Kaspbrak is not a hopeful man. He’s a deeply pessimistic, highly-strung, currently extraordinarily anxious one. </p><p>And that’s why, in any other circumstances, Eddie might have appreciated the thoughtfulness of Richie thinking over his words before simply letting them loose, but right now, in this moment, he really actually just needs him to be talking. </p><p>And yes, in the back of his mind, he <em> is </em> dimly aware he’s being a bit ridiculous, thank you.</p><p>Mandy is his - well, boss might technically be the best word for it, but it’s not really a fitting one. After Derry 2.0 and moving to California to be closer to Richie (moving in <em> with </em> him, for God’s sake, after virtually zero prompting, really subtle there Kaspbrak), he’d been in...somewhat of a tailspin career-wise, to put it lightly. </p><p>An unavoidable consequence of having impulsively slammed the big red fucking <em> QUIT </em> button on both his job and his marriage from the cheap, scratchy sheets of Derry’s best ICU beds, not two hours after he’d woken up again.</p><p>At the time - exhausted, at his wits end, and drugged to the gills - all he really knew was that he didn’t want to return to the soul-sucking, mind-numbing, kind of fucking unethical if he’s honest, capitalist nightmare that was New York’s financial district. Nor did he want to simply transfer to the same basic job in some other city, like some sort of dancing monkey except in warmer weather. </p><p>And so he’d tossed, and turned, and catastrophized for months and endless fucking months over what he wanted to do instead, the conundrum keeping him up at night and for far less worthwhile reasons than have been keeping him up lately. Right up until Richie had made some throwaway comment one morning, blurry-eyed and not really thinking, about how he’d loved cars so much as a kid. How he’d been ace at helping to fix up Went’s old station wagon that one time, remember Eds?</p><p>Forgetting that Eddie’s lifelong modus operandi had always been to violently stress himself into a state of mania right up until the moment he plateaus right back into a chilled calmness, ready and willing to implode his life at the slightest provocation. </p><p>An exquisite pair the two of them make, when “Eddie Kaspbrak” had always basically translated to “not-quite-so-well-concealed-mania” and “Richie Tozier” may as well be a synonym for “unrelenting provocation”. </p><p>Long story short, one thing had led to another and the next thing he knew Eddie was working mornings at a nearby garage, the owner taking him under her wing and acting as a mentor for what still existed of his learning curve after nearly two decades of solely deskwork.</p><p>That was Mandy. And over the weeks of easy conversation and satisfying labour that had left him glowing as he walked home every evening, Eddie had even dared to consider her a friend. Which was - a new and exciting experience for him. A scary one, too. </p><p>He’d spent so many of those in-between years, Derry still ahead of him and Derry always behind, cold and alone in all the ways that had truly mattered to a person, only keeping the most casual of acquaintances and never able to figure out why he felt the need to spurn any threat of permanency. </p><p>Getting the Losers back had rocked his world, no doubt, but he didn’t really consider that to be him <em> making friends, </em> given that he’d had them since childhood and all. Kind of difficult to pat yourself on the back for any kind of interpersonal relationship skills for connections you’d made in fucking diapers. </p><p>And he’s more than aware that he’s a difficult person to get to know. Awkward and aloof, not by nature, but by reluctantly developed instincts that were only now being slowly examined and unlearnt since regaining the support network of his friends back. His family.</p><p>All of this to say that Mandy had been the first real friend he could remember making in decades, and all on his own. He was <em> proud </em> of that. And inviting her and her wife over for dinner for the first time was <em> supposed </em> be an easy evening, but he’s so bent on not ruining what he’s managed to build that he’s wound tighter than a bow at the thought of fucking it all up. </p><p>Richie knows this. Not because Eddie had told him, but because despite what he says, Richie actually pays careful attention to the unspoken cues of what his friends are thinking and feeling at all times. Something that must have contributed not insignificantly to his choice of dress, even if Eddie wouldn’t have had any problem with his usual muppetwear. </p><p>He thinks fondly. </p><p>Now, he breathes heavily through his nose, looking up at Richie beseechingly.</p><p>“Right,” Richie says, voice even, looking around the dining room. “And...are table centrepieces...an absolutely necessary feature for a casual dinner with friends?”</p><p>Now that stops him short. In the whole process of worrying over this one stupid fucking detail, he hadn’t ever stopped to consider whether or not it was even something normal to be worried about in the first place. </p><p>“I don’t - I don’t know?” Eddie says, the innocent enough question doing the diametric opposite of soothing him as the panic in his chest grows even further at his own incompetence. “Oh my fucking God, I don’t <em> know! </em> That’s the whole problem! Fuck!”</p><p>“Okay,” Richie says calmly, a port in the storm with thumbs stroking the inside of his wrist where his pulse has been rabbiting. “Let’s just think this one out, Eds. What would Miguel say?”</p><p>For a moment, he considers doing his best attempts at stalling until Richie forgets what he had even asked of him in the first place, maybe locating a shiny object and using it as a diversionary tactic as to a crow or small child. It works sometimes. </p><p>But in moments like this, Richie is the immovable object to Eddie’s unstoppable force, and he waits him out with eyebrows raised, foot even tapping exaggeratedly against the tile floor. </p><p><em> You will utilize healthy coping mechanisms or I will die making you, </em>his eyes say. </p><p>“Ugh, you and your fucking hard-on for what Miguel would have to say in any given situation.” Eddie mutters, evidently not quietly enough. </p><p>“Amen, Eddie-baby,” Richie responds, just as cheerful as ever. “You know nothing gets my rocks off like your thriving mental wellness.”</p><p>He hates that that sounds true.</p><p>Miguel, for his part, is the therapist Eddie had started seeing a few months back, somewhere between uprooting his whole life and realizing that sticking your head in the sand and recklessly transgressing every previous rule you’d ever lived by in an attempt to stick it to your dead mother wasn’t exactly a fix-all strategy for one's life. </p><p>And okay, yes, it’s proven itself helpful in the long run. But Eddie acknowledges that only reluctantly, and with great resentment. </p><p>He doesn’t <em> like </em> therapy, which - are you even supposed to? He doesn’t fucking know. Are there actually people out there who fucking <em> enjoy </em> some guy in a cushy chair looking at them over their glasses and giving them an itemized list of all of their behavioural failures? Telling you exactly what to do with your life and embodying deep disappointment when you do not? </p><p>Not that that’s what Miguel <em> does</em>, but it hadn’t exactly been on Eddie’s top-list of priorities to transition neatly from Sonia, to Myra, to the unknown Miguel in terms of people who exist to keep him accountable to somebody else’s idea of health and wellness. </p><p>And he’d told Richie this very firmly the moment the topic had come up after Derry and everybody was still scrambling trying to figure out where to go from there. And Richie hadn’t pushed, and he hadn’t made fun of him. He’d just shrugged and said that it’s Eddie’s choice what he wants to do for himself, and left it at that, even if Eddie could tell that his opinion probably tilted more towards the counselling side of things. Like everybody else’s seemed to. </p><p>Actually, it was Bill who had finally convinced him to go in the end. </p><p>Moving to California had added benefits besides an immediate proximity with Richie, even if that was the top one. Health food and junk available in equal measure; consistently warm weather that felt nothing like the dismal greys of Maine or the sharp cold of New York; endless nature trails for Eddie to escape to when needed, and, most importantly, the closeness of his other friends. </p><p>Not that they’re all there, just yet. Mike and Bev have been sharing a place somewhere between Richie and Bill’s houses for about a month now, and of course the latter two have been here for years already. But Stan and Patty’s relocation has more moving pieces to consider before they can just go ahead and uproot, and Ben’s still trying to figure out the business arrangements side of things for himself. </p><p>But for now, the four of them have weekly rotating dinners, and Eddie likes to meet Bill at a local cafe after his runs in the morning, before Richie’s even awake. When he’s feeling particularly charitable, he’ll bring him home a blueberry smoothie. </p><p>Eddie’s own drink of choice is usually a lavender vanilla latte, something light and fresh for after his workout. </p><p><em> Usually</em>. And Bill knew this, - sometimes ordering for him ahead of time if he was running late - which is only the least of the reasons why he had stood there stock-still, staring at Eddie one morning two weeks after the start of their little ritual, every square inch of the table in front of him already covered in a bevy of food items notably banned from his palette. </p><p>Almond cookies. Brown sugar muffins. Chocolate-drizzled pancakes. Fucking <em> extra gluten </em> lemon-loaf. And a manic gleam in his eye. </p><p><em> Right, okay, </em> Bill had said, seating himself opposite him and cutting straight to the heart of the matter with only a second glance, <em> So you know that even p-people with no allergies at all wouldn’t be eating all this at once, right? </em></p><p>Eddie had scowled, stabbing at a pancake spitefully and shoving it into his mouth. Hearing Bills acknowledge it, even if only tangentially, felt like a challenge to be risen to. </p><p><em> You’re going to make yourself s-sick, </em>Bill had warned next, but Eddie was in no headspace to be listening to that, nor any other thoughts he had on the matter over the course of their meal. </p><p>An hour later, Eddie was slamming up the house steps, hurtling through the front door and rushing past a surprised Richie to vomit up what was left of his breakfast. Standing there in the pristine kitchen, his body sweat-soaked and the previously gleaming sink defiled, felt like a low point. </p><p><em> Alright, jackass, </em> Eddie had said hoarsely into the phone, still leaning over the counter and ignoring the alarmed presence behind him. <em> You might have had a point.  </em></p><p><em> Mhm, </em> Bill hummed pleasantly, <em> And what p-point was that exactly? </em></p><p>Eddie had scowled, despite the fact that Bill couldn’t see him. <em>That</em> <em>I’ve been using what my mother and Myra thought about me as an excuse to do a bunch of stupid shit that I wouldn’t otherwise do and that I should probably not fucking do that</em>, he recited nearly. </p><p><em> Gee</em>, Bill had said, deadpan. <em> I wonder what a mental-health professional would have to say about this r-revelation. </em></p><p>Asshole. But in the end he was right, and before the day was out Eddie had an appointment booked for the very next week. </p><p>But honestly, he doesn’t want to think about what Miguel would tell him right now, even if he knows that Richie is right that it’s the smartest course of action. He’s busy <em> spiralling</em>, thank you, and it’s a lot more effort to drag himself out of it right now than it would be to simply let himself devolve into shambles and pick up the pieces later.</p><p>But when he looks up at the earnest face of his best friend, he’s reminded that he isn’t alone at all. He doesn’t have to claw himself out of any panic, because that’s what the man in front of him is here to help with. Damn it.</p><p>Richie raises an eyebrow, and Eddie sighs, defeated.</p><p>“These thoughts aren’t helping me,” he recites dutifully. “Worrying that Mandy won’t like me anymore if I don’t get everything perfectly right probably isn’t true, or kind to myself, or helpful to the problem at hand.” </p><p>“<em>Definitely </em>isn’t true,” Richie amends, continuing to stroke his hands. “But good, Eds. I’d probably add that her and her wife will be happy just to be around you, because they’re your friends and they value your presence just for who you are, and not for what you may or may not bring to the table.”</p><p>He casts an eye over Eddie’s shoulder. “Literally or metaphorically.”</p><p>Eddie sighs, body going lax and folding forward just enough that Richie steps into the space between them to keep him propped up instead of whacking him for that last comment. He’s patient as he waits for Eddie to come down from the adrenaline high of his panic, humming thoughtlessly as he allows him to reorder his thoughts. </p><p>“Okay,” Eddie says eventually, lifting his forehead from the chest in front of him. “Okay, I’m - good. Fine. It’s good. I’m normal now.”</p><p>“It is,” Richie agrees easily, grinning down at him. “No worries here, Spaghetti-man. We’re gonna have a good night. But I’m sorry to say that you will never be normal.”</p><p>And that should be the end of the matter. Except it isn’t actually, because with Richie, nothing ever ends when you think it will. </p><p>As shown by the way the man then says “And anyway-”, before sauntering over to the kitchen counter to produce what turns out to be a cellophane-wrapped bouquet of tulips, bright and cheerful and carefully handled to avoid any accidental crushing or bending.  </p><p>The flowers are bright and bountiful, just the right size to fit into a tabletop-sized vase. And all Eddie can do is stare at the offering, struck silent and dumb while Richie, for his part, just waits, patient and quiet and more than a little bit smug. </p><p>The thoughtfulness of the gesture has completely undone him. And the feeling is overwhelming suddenly, how foolish it might have been to be entertaining all the thoughts of marriage that he has in the past few months. </p><p>Maybe he’s been greedy, this whole time. Asking for too much. Maybe the two of them were already married in all the ways that mattered, just without that eternally longed for, reciprocated love. This, here, is only further proof of that, surely? </p><p>Maybe they’d been married since the moment they’d first seen each other again in Derry. Eddie feels like they have, anyway. Does the form of it really matter? Does it need external acknowledgment to exist?</p><p>Richie has already given him so much - <em> gives </em>him so much, every single day. It would be - just so ridiculously self-indulgent to ask him for more. </p><p><em> God, </em>he berates himself. <em> He’s brought you flowers, Kaspbrak. He doesn’t owe you his hand and his whole life, too.  </em></p><p>As if hearing these internal reprimands, Richie reaches out with a small, tucked-in grin to cut through it all like a knife through butter, handing over the tulips, their fingers brushing burningly against one another with the pass over. </p><p>“Better get those in water, Kaspbrak,” he says. </p><p>Eddie wishes that Richie would make it a little harder to be in love with him, sometimes. </p><p>He wishes that he could be brave enough to close that last little bit of distance that lies between them, selfishness be damned. </p><p>He wishes that Richie had cause to say <em> Tozier</em>, instead.</p><p> </p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>Three days later, he’s decisively changed his mind once again. Melancholy Eddie who reprimanded himself for not living content with unspoken devotion was in reality just over-stressed and underfed, and felt different about the whole matter after eating his share of the honey-glazed salmon.</p><p>No, really. He’d entertained the self-aggrandizement for only as long as it took for him to inhale some carbs, at which point he’d thought, <em> Wait no, I’m a genius actually. Richie should be both legally and eternally bound to me and I’ll say that again.  </em></p><p>And anyway, if hadn’t already changed his mind by then, he certainly would have now. </p><p>Because this morning, the two of them had impulsively packed up and driven to Joshua Tree National Park for a daytrip. And right now Richie is bent down on the ground to pet the head of some passing jogger’s Bichon Frisé, laughing delightedly when it bounds up to lick at his face, paws on his knees. </p><p>Eddie is waiting just off the side of the path for him, his 25oz stainless-steel thermos hanging securely from the mesh carrier leashed to his shoulder, Richie’s cheap sunglasses and turtle-patterned one, fucking hilarious, shoved hastily into his arms, given to him to watch over as soon as he’d sighted the puppy. </p><p>He doesn’t mind. Richie’s always basically been a water bottle that it’s his job to look after, so it’s not like he’s untrained. </p><p>The clouds have parted just right to blanket the right side of Richie’s face in golden sunlight, revealing the faint and usually invisible freckles on the bridge of his nose. There is no smooth metal ring on his hand for the sunbeams to reflect off of, no justifiable reason for why he suddenly feels as if he needs to swoop down and press a hard kiss to thes stubbled side of his face, promise him his own puppy, and a home, and a whole life together. </p><p>The absence of that privilege, here and now, feels particularly unacceptable. Spiritual, unspoken marriage be damned. </p><p>Eddie feels like a wild zoo animal, rattling the bars of his cage.</p><p> </p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>In mid-November, Eddie really plans to do it.</p><p>In mid-November, Eddie falls sick. Like - for real, down for the count, stupid fucking sick.</p><p>Here’s the thing: he’s been so distracted thinking about the ins and outs, the how’s and why’s and when’s of proposing to Richie, that he’s allowed other, less important priorities to slip under his radar in the meantime. </p><p>Hand sanitization multiple times daily being one of those things - who can remember to, when Richie’s standing there in his periphery, assigning the cereal box characters stupid voices in the grocery store? What’s a mob to a king, a king to a god, a liquified bacteria-killer to a B-list comedian, etc. </p><p>And it <em> isn’t </em>one of his unhealthy tendencies, really, it isn’t! Everybody knows that grocery stores and public railings are breeding grounds for bacteria, and even if the thought doesn’t haunt Eddie the same way that it used to, he still just really hates getting the fucking flu. </p><p>And now here he is anyway, unsanitized and still inca-fucking-pacitated. Just fantastic. </p><p>The whole situation is intolerable - it’s fucking<em> unbearable</em>, actually. Only yesterday he’d decided he was so tired of pussying out of just talking to Richie about what’s been bothering him that he’d acted before he could truly think about it, booking the two of them a reservation at some fancy upscale restaurant downtown. </p><p>Close enough to home that it wouldn’t be a hassle to get there. Far enough away that it was clear that a special effort was being made. Candlelight and roses, and a private table near the back so that they could both just relax and eat their dinner without worrying about any prying eyes and the ears around them. </p><p>Or at least, that was the <em> plan. </em>Until he’d woken up today feeling like he was on his last legs, face uncomfortably warm and throat scratchy and painful. </p><p>For a moment, Eddie dares to hope that it’s simply a false alarm. He tries briefly to sit up, hands pressed against the mattress to push his body up, but his limbs feel like brittle glass and he goes crashing back against the blankets just as soon as he’s risen. </p><p>He turns his face to scream into the pillow beneath his cheek. But his throat doesn’t cooperate, choking him instead as the sound hits a wall and refuses to move any further. </p><p>To sublimate his frustration, Eddie flops over, sweeping a childish hand over his bedside table so that both the alarm clock and water bottle go tumbling loudly to the floor. Who fucking cares now that he has <em> all damn day </em> to clean it back up. </p><p>Footsteps outside his room halt hesitantly at the crash, doubling back after only a second and Eddie curses himself for not waiting just a minute longer to lose it on his belongings. Or to check the time on the clock. </p><p>“Eds?” he hears, knuckles rapping against his door. “You, uh, all good in there, man?”</p><p><em> Ugh. “</em>Come in!” he tries to call, stupidly, but his throat still doesn’t deign to work, not even the slightest sound emerging.</p><p>So he chucks a pillow hard at the door. It’ll have to do.</p><p>The door <em> snicks </em> open, Richie apparently correctly guessing that an Eddie who didn’t want company would simply have ignored his calls and let him be. He steps into the room carefully, face peeking around first before seeing the curled-up form in the centre of the bed, still in his pajamas. </p><p>On a normal day Eddie would already have been awake and dressed for work two hours ago. </p><p>Richie walks over to the bed, crawling up once he’s reached it and poking at the bundle of blankets he’s barricaded himself under. Eddie doesn’t say anything to this - because he fucking can’t - and just shakes his head vehemently. </p><p>“What’s the matter, Eds?” Richie tries gently. The lack of response seems to have put him under the false assumption that Eddie isn’t answering back because he’s somewhere in the realm of too emotionally overwhelmed to, and not because he’s literally just fucking unable. </p><p>Eddie sticks his head out of the blanket nest warily and opens his mouth. </p><p>No. He closes it again.</p><p>“Hm?” Richie shuffles closer, hands warm and soft even in Eddie’s fevered state.</p><p>Oh fuck no, not the hands. That’s - that’s dirty play. He’s one of those nocturnal moths and Richie’s big hands are the flickering porch light drawing him into their light before zapping him to death.</p><p>Eddie opens his mouth, and time he - he honks.</p><p>He <em> honks. </em></p><p>Immediately, his face burns from embarrassment, and he leans down to shove his head in his bent up legs to bury it hidden.  </p><p>“Oh no, darling,” Richie murmurs with a small smile, not even noticing the slip of his tongue in letting the endearment fly past. He reaches out to bury a hand in Eddie’s hair, fingers petting softly through the waves all frizzed up and loose from being sick. “You’re sick, huh?”</p><p>Eddie shakes his head again. Not in denial, but because the vigorous motion is the only method he has at the moment of expressing his displeasure, and he’s going to take it. </p><p>Richie tsks. “It’s okay, hm? Just a little under the weather. You can just rest up today and you’ll be right as rain in no time, honey.” </p><p>The name settles into Eddie’s stomach like sticky syrup, as does the familiar expression. Nicknames already abound on an hourly basis when you’re friends with Richie Tozier, but the man is apparently capable of getting even more affectionate when Eddie’s in front of him, worn out and visibly sick. </p><p>He doesn’t necessarily consider this a...<em> bad </em> development. That’s why a lifetime of progress is nearly undone by the swift and wild thought of <em> Should I be getting sick more often? </em></p><p>He feels like shit, okay! He’s allowed to want to feel small and cared for and coddled, just for a fucking <em> moment. </em> He’s allowed! Miguel would say so too. </p><p>But Richie doesn’t understand. Right as rain in no time isn’t an option, not when he has plans <em> now. </em></p><p>“But I made us reservations,” Eddie says, except what comes out of his mouth is only a sad little beeping honk once again. </p><p>Richie makes a sympathetic face. </p><p>“Hang on,” he says, hand passing briefly down to cup Eddie’s face before hopping off the bed and returning from his office thirty second later with a pen and notepad in hand.</p><p>He hands it to Eddie carefully, climbing back up to fold himself on the bed. Eddie looks down at the notebook on his lap and feels the urge to start crying again. It’s - it’s one of Richie’s special ones, the ones he keeps stored away carefully in his bookshelf to keep the first drafts of all of his set ideas in, and let’s nobody, under pain of death, touch. </p><p>Eddie had found it so endearing when he’d learnt of it after moving in. Carefree and forgetful as he may perpetually appear to others, Richie had stuttered almost nervously when Eddie asked him about the elegantly bound notebooks tucked into his office’s smallest bookcase. They were gifts, he’d explained, birthday presents from Maggie and Went. Ever since his first paid set, they’d gotten him a new set every year, <em> Richie W. Tozier </em> embossed on the front in beautiful calligraphic letters, tiny little glasses underneath it shining in gold leaf. Fucking cute. </p><p>Uncapping the sharpie, the strong chemical scent almost too strong for Eddie’s nose, he brings the notebook carefully up to his legs and scribbles out an answer. </p><p>
  <em> I made us reservations for tonight.  </em>
</p><p>He passes the notebook over. </p><p>Richie’s mouth moves silently as he reads the words in front of him. When he’s finished, his body stills for a moment before he raises his head to look back at the other man. </p><p>Eddie’s lip trembles. </p><p>“Eds,” Richie says gently, moving the notebook carefully to the side table for the moment to keep it safe as he shuffles nearer to wrap Eddie up in his big arms and hold him close. “It’s <em> fine,</em> honey. We can go out to dinner any old night, you don’t need to be so sad about it.”</p><p>But Eddie’s shaking his head before he can even finish, gesturing impatiently for the notebook back so he can elucidate. </p><p><span class="u"><em> Special</em></span> <em> reservations.  </em></p><p>At the underlined words, Richie’s eyebrows raise even higher. He seems a little more hesitant when he turns back to meet Eddie’s eyes, his own just a little more guarded and questioning than before.</p><p>Eddie looks back at him beseechingly. He honks. </p><p>“Well,” Richie says, scraping a hand across his stubbled chin, looking regretful. “I, uh, don’t know what made them so special, Eds. But you <em> really </em> can’t go out like this. I’m sorry.” </p><p>Eddie's face screws up, a frustrated little kick of his leg shoving outwards before he can curb the impulse. Richie’s mouth trembles as if he wants to laugh, but wonder of all wonders - he manages to keep that one in, too. </p><p>“What can I do to help you, Eddie baby?” Richie asks instead, and Eddie’s fevered brain has his toes curling happily at the name, thinking <em> That’s me. I’m baby</em>. Richie’s hand has migrated down to cover that kicking leg, and the heat of his palm keeps it settled and still. </p><p>Eddie knows that he’s conscious of the sensitivities that he has when it comes to allowing other people to take care of him, and he appreciates his asking rather than simply doing more than he can say.</p><p>“Stay here with me, please,” Eddie expresses in a series of beeps.</p><p>He pats the space beside him to make his point, and Richie’s face lights up at the invitation. </p><p>“Now that I can do.”</p><p>He wriggles himself into the blankets with Eddie, gathering him up and presenting to him an ideal landscape on which to rest his aching head and body. The feeling of his soft, broad chest under Eddie’s fevered cheek feels like nothing short of heaven. </p><p>He beeps at him gratefully.</p><p>“Oh, absolutely,” Richie responds. “That’s what I always say.” </p><p>And that’s how they pass the time there, the two of them, bundled up cozily, Eddie honking intermittently and Richie talking back to him the same way you speak to an infant, or perhaps an animal when they make unintelligible noises at you but you don’t want them to feel left out of the conversation.</p><p>The fact of his failure still won’t stop niggling at him though. </p><p>It’s dark outside now, and the two of them have been lying there for hours when Eddie finally, mournfully, says, “Now you’ll really never marry me,” thinking of their empty seats waiting all alone out there at their private table.</p><p><em>Honk</em>, Eddie mouth says. </p><p>“Oh, most certainly untrue, my dear fellow,” Richie blusters back absently as the British Gentleman. His hand has been sweeping even strokes down Eddie’s back and he seems to be growing sleepy himself, voice slower and more mumbling as time wears on. Eddie wishes the strokes were a little less smooth; that there was a noticeable little bump felt on every pass of his hand from the sharp kiss of cold metal. “Absolutely preposterous, I won’t hear a word of it.” </p><p>Eddie sniffles. It’s no use. </p><p>“Silly goose,” Richie adds meaningfully with a little smile, nose crinkling happily at the smaller man’s visible displeasure. </p><p>Hmph. He gives it up for now, the heavy exhaustion of sickness creeping back up to weigh on his eyelids, and Eddie pushes Richie back against the bed almost unthinkingly. Once he’s there, he curls back up against his chest, allowing himself in this moment of vulnerability to believe that those words could possibly be true. </p><p>It’s a comforting thought, at least. That maybe even when they aren’t using the same words, they’re still speaking the same language. </p><p> </p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>Early December, Eddie is back to full health once more, voice louder and less avian than ever. More than well enough to feel up to meeting all the Losers at a local sports bar for Patty’s birthday celebration, certainly, if not quickly enough to salvage his attempt at a romantic proposal dinner. </p><p>He’s not gotten any closer to popping the question to Richie in the meantime, but he’s hopeful that maybe he can at least get some actual answers out of the man about his general thoughts on the matter now that the drinks have been flowing for a good few hours. </p><p>If he ever fucking returns from the washroom, that is. </p><p>“But on a deserted island?” Mike is asking skeptically, looking completely unconvinced by Eddie’s admittedly inebriated chain of reasoning. </p><p>“Yeah, I’m...not sure Richie would be able to help your chances of survival there exactly, Eds,” Ben says, looking simultaneously apologetic and unwilling to recant, even at Eddie’s responding glare. “Sorry.”</p><p>The area around the booth that the eight of them are seated at is loud enough that they all have to shout a bit to be heard over the noise, but that’s not anything different from their usual way of being. Eddie feels loose and happy, the night already one to remember though it’s not yet over: jokes and laughter and easy arms around shoulders, with each of the Losers insisting on spotting at least one round of drinks for everyone else. Eddie had grabbed the very first round pretty soon after they’d all sat down, and with the street lights flickering on and the sky growing darker outside the window, he’s definitely begun to feel the effects of all those free drinks passed his way afterwards. </p><p>Not in a bad way, which might just be the biggest revelation of the night. In the past, Eddie had mostly abstained from social drinking, the ethanol making him morose and longing more than anything, nostalgic for some feeling he wasn’t ever quite able to remember. But here, like this, surrounded by all of his favourite people, and a downright palpable atmosphere of love, he feels good. He feels <em> really </em> good, floaty and warm and quick to laugh, if a bit bereft at the present absence of a certain somebody beside him. </p><p>Richie had grabbed the latest round for them, dismissing himself for the bathroom shortly after with a grin. He’s still yet to return, and in the meantime - somehow, he blames fucking Bill and Mike for the topic change - the rest of them have started arguing on the age-old question of who and what, if given the choice, they would bring with them to an abandoned island. </p><p>Not his fault they don’t like his choice. Even sober Eddie would have been willing to die on this particular hill, but it must be said that drunk Eddie is feeling particularly passionate about it. </p><p>Sober Eddie may also have noticed, as the rest of them already had, that a certain somebody had actually returned from the washroom thirty seconds ago, hovering quietly behind the currently gesticulating man to eavesdrop in the hopes of gathering some blackmail material for later. </p><p>Yes, another Eddie may have noticed. But not this one. </p><p>“Well, <em> duh,” </em>he scoffs back, looking as if he’s trying his best to glare at Ben, but succeeding only in crossing his eyes and slumping dizzily to the side of the booth. “I’m not bringing him there to chop down some fucking coconut trees for me and build a lean-to, genius. It’s because he’s like - like, my favourite person ever. No fucking duh, I’d choose him.”</p><p>“He keeps me company.” he says also after a moment, simply and, though he would deny it, quite sweetly.</p><p>This stops the lot of them short for a moment, conversation faltering as the unexpected tenderness stutters the as-of-yet consistent flow of teasing. But only for a moment, before they exchange too-quick conspiratorial looks, whilst Richie, who remains unnoticed from behind Eddie’s back, sucks in a sharp, surprised breath. </p><p>It’s just as well that he remains hidden. The previous statements are just a little too incriminating for any Eddie to have said so earnestly in any state, and however true it is, he’s not sure he’d be able to defend them coherently right now if pressed to. </p><p>He takes another sip at his drink. Whatever Richie had brought back for him, the sweet and fruity taste is calling out to him like a siren to keep drinking. He ignores the annoyingly persistent knowledge that his recent stress has him drinking more tonight than he usually would, and how at this juncture he really ought to have been cut off two rounds ago for his own good. </p><p>Tilting his head up at the ceiling, he marvels at the kaleidoscope of colours he sees reflected there. The lights are so pretty in this place, like little twinkling constellations. </p><p>“Oh, <em> Richie </em> is, huh?” Mike asks, leaning back to casually throw an arm behind Ben’s head where he sits beside him, and frowning exaggeratedly across the booth. “Break my heart, why don’t you.”</p><p>A moving picture pops into Eddie’s head, then, the two of them on the meadow of Mike’s farm as children, chasing the newborn lambs into the open gate of the enclosure and laughing like morons at the difficulty of the task. He stumbles as he tries to lean over the table and pat clumsily at Mike’s arm to apologize for what could never have been, not quite sober enough to catch the joking glint in Mike’s eye. “‘M’<em> sorry </em> Mikey, I can’t help it. He was there first. It’s not - not your fault.”</p><p>Mike snorts, but now someone else is feeling belligerent.</p><p>“Hey! Technically <em> I </em>was there f-first, actually,” Bill protests, shoving his way into the exchange with all the grace of a kneecapped elephant and stomping tantrum attitude of Eddie’s very first friend. “Why not me, huh?”</p><p>“Eddie was <em> my </em> best friend first; no, he was <em> my </em>best friend first,” Bev imitates them in a mocking, high-pitched voice and Stan shakes with laughter.</p><p>“No, no, no, you dummies, in m’<em> heart,</em>” Eddie clarifies, waving his hands around. “He was there first. Still there, too. Always was, like - like -”</p><p>Eddie pats around at his chest, like he’s trying physically to find the source of all that love tangled up inside him, twisting him around, even when he hadn’t even known who the man in it was. Somewhere in the back of his drunk mind, he remembers what they’d used to say about him as a kid, those friends of his: that Eddie Kaspbrak could guide you anywhere, navigate the most complex labyrinth and any other place in this world with all the confidence and ease of a native inhabitant. For a kid who’d had so little going for him in his own mind, he’d held onto that distinction fiercely in his grabbing little fists like he had hardly anything else. </p><p>Only Richie and that. Richie and that.</p><p>“Compass brain,” he finishes, tapping at his forehead now, beaming proudly at having gotten there. “Richie’s m’lodestone. That’s the word.”</p><p>The rest of them soften visibly at this, Patty’s eyes even going so far as to shine with affected tears (she, like Eddie, is an emotional drunk). Even Stan can’t find anything snarky to say about it, but it’s Mike’s own gentle grin that has Eddie remembering the last point he was trying to make. </p><p>“But it’s - it’s okay, you know. You’re very pretty, too, Mikey.” he concludes, patting his arm consolingly, and the moment is broken. </p><p>“Oh, as long as I’m <em> pretty,” </em>Mike splutters, rolling his eyes heavenward, but still laughing along with the rest of them. “Just not as much as Richie. Understood.”</p><p>Eddie scoffs, offended at the very idea. “No one on <em> earth </em> is more attractive than Richie. Like - no offence.” </p><p>Oh. Now at that, Richie <em> really </em> blushes, even while the others pose their immediate and obvious objections.</p><p>(“Kind of a gangly f-fucker, isn’t he?” “Those <em> glasses </em> , Eddie, really-” “Of all fucking things, Kaspbrak, <em> pretty? </em> How the f-” “You’ve seen his clothing, haven’t you? You’ve witnessed that?” “I mean his shirts <em> alone</em>-”)</p><p>“<em>No, </em>shut up, shut up!” Eddie shrieks, shaking his hands. “You guys’re all fucking maligned. He is <em> so, </em>he’s pretty, he’s got these - these fucking eyes! And these lips and hands and shoulders and-” </p><p>“You're just listing body parts!” Bev laughs, nearly wheezing when Eddie stands up in his seat to point an accusatory finger at her.</p><p>“No I’m <em> not,” </em>Eddie argues, getting louder now. “You said how’s he pretty, that’s what you <em> said</em>. I’m <em> telling </em> you. You didn’t even let me say his hair-”</p><p>Bill snorts. “Don’t you mean handsome, E-Eds?”</p><p>“Fuck you too, Bill!” Eddie shrieks, wheeling around and stumbling slightly as he moves to point his finger at him now. “It’s 2016, dickhead! Men can be pretty!”</p><p>“Yeah, fuck you Bill!” Mike joins in, accepting the loud cracking high-five that Eddie offers him for his support. The others catch onto this scheme like hyenas scenting blood, all of a sudden speaking over themselves to sing the praises of pretty, pretty Richie Tozier. </p><p>Bill splutters, wounded at the turnaround.  </p><p>“Might’ve said <em> you </em> were pretty, too, if you weren’t so rude about it,” Eddie sniffs, when the table’s settled down once again. </p><p>Bill perks up. “Am I?”</p><p>“Nope,” Eddie says cheerfully, and that sets them off again.</p><p>The chatter of the bar is loud enough to blanket them even once their own laughter and shouts have settled. Eddie feels ninety-nine percent content here, floating body and buzzing head as he waits for that final one percent to make his way back from the washroom. </p><p>Of course, it is them, and they are all together, and the comfortable atmosphere was never going to last for long. </p><p>“Wonder who R-Richie’s favourite person is,” Bill says, grinning at the silent middle finger he gets in return from the man who all but one know has been standing there for minutes already. </p><p>“You really are so dumb, Bill,” Eddie scoffs, face falling into the slightest hint of a pout. He looks down mournfully at where both of his hands stay clenched around the cold condensation of his drink. “That’s obvious too. ‘ts Stanley.” </p><p>Cast in the relative shadow of the booth, Eddie’s face is doleful, looking like a child whose toy has just been taken from him. <em> Stan </em> looks almost gleeful at this interpretation, turning his head into Patty’s shoulder to muffle his snorts. He doesn’t even try to correct Eddie; barely even recovers from his laughter before catching sight of Richie’s outraged face and falling to pieces all over again.</p><p>Eddie, for his part doesn’t know what’s so fucking funny. It’s <em> true. </em>Richie and Stan have been best friends since forever, and his serendipitous return from the dead had only cemented and solidified that bond. Most nights of the week can see the two of them on the phone with each other for hours, always the ones in the loop about what’s going on in the others’ neck of the woods before anybody else is.</p><p>“<em>Stan</em>,” Patty tries to scold her husband, giggling a bit herself. “Stop it. That’s not nice.”</p><p>“I can’t help it, Patty,” Stan whispers back quiet, but not quiet enough. “They’re just so fucking <em> dumb</em>. I’ve had to deal with it for way longer than any one person should be expected to already.”</p><p>Eddie stares at the pair of them with squinted eyes for a second, trying to figure out what they’re talking about, before giving it up with a shrug. </p><p>He’s feeling a bit… low now, actually. Getting the chance to extol the virtues of the man he loves was nice enough at first, but coupled with the reminder that he doesn't even rank first place of all the people in Richie’s life, it’s all is a pretty damn sobering wake-up call. </p><p>The others watch his silent drop, contrasted so strongly with his earlier exuberance, swirling around the little umbrella in his glass as his shoulders slump. Richie is frozen in place where he stands, and Stan gestures a pointed shoulder to indicate that he should probably return to the table now to snap him out of it. </p><p>Richie scrambles to hop to it. </p><p>“Hey gang,” he says, shouldering his way into the booth with them, body pressed tight against Eddie’s. “Sorry about that, bathroom line was for <em> miles.” </em></p><p>Eddie whips his head to the side in sudden shock. He’d been so lost in his thoughts, he hadn’t even noticed Richie’s return - now, or ten minutes ago when he’d first gotten back to the table. </p><p>“<em>Yesss</em>,” he cheers now, part of his drink spilling down his shirt in his exuberance. He doesn’t even notice the cold, his delight at seeing Richie again beating all else. He can’t even remember what he was just so sad about. “Richie, you’re back!”</p><p>Richie laughs, raising an arm to tuck it securely over Eddie’s shoulders and pulling him even tighter against him, tucking the smaller man’s body into his own like a puzzle piece slotting into place. </p><p>“Sure am, Eddie my love.”</p><p>Eddie’s body wriggles happily at the nickname, so inebriated he can’t quite curb the impulse, and Richie’s smile ticks even higher at having caught it. </p><p>Eddie is dimly aware of this, but can’t find it in himself to remember why he should care. He’s so tired suddenly, as if the effect of the alcohol was just waiting for him to relax far enough to hit him full-force, and send him careening swiftly into dreamland. Richie says something into the ear of his rapidly wilting form, but he can’t quite catch it well enough to make it out. He yawns widely instead, head turning instinctively to fit into the place where Richie’s neck meets his shoulder. He’ll ask him later.</p><p>There are worse places in the world to sleep, anyhow, and none he’s found that have yet been better. </p><p> </p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>Getting home that night is a bit of a blur, flashing streetlamps and splashing puddles as late-night taxis drive past existing as the strongest memories in his mind afterwards. </p><p>He doesn’t even remember all that he says to Richie on that walk home.</p><p>“I’d be s’good y’know,” he tells him, feet tangling up and almost tripping him as he walks, kept aloft by the strong hand at his waist and elbow. “I would, promise. Be so good to you.”</p><p>“I know, Eds,” he hears beside him. He can’t lift his head from studying the wet sidewalk beneath him with all the fascination of an eight year-old child seeing a cool bug for the first time. </p><p>“Buy you <em> flowers, </em>and make you lunches,” he says, almost sing-songs, smiling woozily, dreamily at the very thought. “Be at all yr’shows. Front row.” </p><p>Rain starts to fall even heavier as they walk. None of them had thought to bring an umbrella, close as they all lived, but Eddie doesn’t mind. He likes the feel of the cool raindrops on his overheated skin, the sharp smell in the air of asphalt and dust. Life. </p><p>Bev comes up beside him opposite Richie, saying something above his head that he doesn’t hear. He tugs at her wrist instead, needing suddenly their friend to corroborate his claims, let Richie know that none of these are empty promises. Bev doesn’t lie. </p><p>He’a impatient enough that he interrupts whatever conversation it is they’ve got going between them. </p><p>“Wouldn’t I, Bev?” he asks almost childishly, eyes wide and hopeful, laughing as he trips slightly into a puddle and gets the front of his shoes all soaking wet. “Wouldn’t I be such a good husband to Richie? I would, right?”</p><p>“<em>Oh</em>,” he hears a gasp above his head, but he ignores it, holding Bev’s gaze patiently, waiting for her to agree.</p><p>Bev’s mouth is parted open slightly, eyes flickering quickly back and forth between the two men. </p><p>When an answer isn’t forthcoming, his face falls and his heart plummets alongside it, all of his worst fears confirmed. </p><p>“Oh,” Eddie says, voice small. “I knew it.”</p><p>“Oh - Eddie, no,” Bev is quick to say, hands hovering unsure over his arm while Richie remains frozen beside them. “I didn’t mea-“</p><p>But he doesn’t want to hear why she thinks he wouldn’t be good for Richie, good <em> to </em> Richie, even though he knows he’d move heaven and earth to try, if he had to. Nobody gets that. He tugs his arms out of both of their grips, staggering dizzily away and ignoring their attempts to corral him back.</p><p>“<em>No,</em>” he says firmly, though he doesn’t know how effectively it really translates. “I wanna walk w’Bill now.” </p><p>And he must have been close enough to hear and catch the seriousness in his voice, because it’s Bill’s hand that reaches out instantly towards him, closer than he’d expected. </p><p>“Come on, Eds,” he says softly, tugging him close so that his unbalanced feet remain upright and sure. “It’s all okay. Let’s get you home.” </p><p>The droplets against his face have lessened now. The streetlights don’t shine quite so bright in the puddles as they had seemed to at the beginning of the walk, but the moon is higher up in the sky, and the bright white of the crescent gives him a solid shape to focus on as he moves forward. </p><p>Gravel against his feet, warm air surrounding him in a rush of heat, a gentle hand around his wrist as he falls heavily into the soft sheets of his bedroom at home. Their home. </p><p>
  <br/>
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</p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>Two days later he gets a package in the mail. </p><p>Richie’s the only one at home when it arrives, but the jeweller had promised discreet shipping, and the box is innocuous and indicative of nothing on the outside, just as promised. </p><p>As soon as Eddie gets home, he’s hurrying the box to his room, avoiding Richie’s curious eyes and tearing open the flaps, back pressed against the door as if the man will come bursting in at any moment to demand to see what the problem is. It’s easy enough to ignore the curious looks - Richie has been giving him odd looks for a few days now, not that he knows why, and he’s actually grateful for the slight excuse for a reprieve this offers him.</p><p>The second the metal hits the light, smooth gold catching the shine just right and shimmering green of the Alexandrite refracting in a thousand different directions, Eddie’s breath catches in his throat. </p><p>At first it’s pure panic. <em> What were you thinking, are you crazy, God, this is the most foolish thing you have ever done. </em></p><p>It's almost instantly drowned out by a louder, far more important thought. </p><p>A beautiful ring, he thinks. For a beautiful man. </p><p>
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</p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>“Is this a bad idea?” Eddie asks, phone cradled against his face. The ring box is sitting directly across from him, central in his field of vision.</p><p>“<em>Does it feel like a bad idea?” </em> Mike asks back, voice crackling from the shit cabin reception of whatever forest him and Bill have been hiking through today. </p><p>“No, no, no,” Eddie warns, “Do not play the therapist with me right now. Just be straight. Is this whole thing bound to be a disaster?” </p><p>Mike is silent for a moment.</p><p>“<em>I</em> <em>think that for anybody else it would be, at the very least, misguided,” </em>he says, thoughtful. “<em>But you know, for you two? I think it just might be okay.</em>”</p><p>Eddie lets out a deep breath. </p><p>“Okay,” he says. “Okay.”</p><p>
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</p><p>****</p><p> </p><p>Elegant candlelit dinners hadn’t panned out. Impulsive bombardments of questions had yielded no results. Inebriated soliloquizing was humiliating, but ultimately ineffective. </p><p>He doesn’t know where to go from here. So rather than create another elaborate and doomed plan, he’s out in their yard at dusk, atop Richie’s giant fucking rusty ladder to tackle the ivy that’s been creeping up towards their rain gutters. Not to get rid of it entirely - he likes it, thinks its quite pretty, actually - but he doesn’t want any flooding, and if he can’t fix his situation with Richie, he’ll fix their house’s fucking water collection channel instead<em>. </em></p><p>Eddie swipes a hand over the sweat collecting on his forehead, and leans his head against the galvanized steel, biting the dirty gloves off his hands and feeling a small and weird triumph at the successful execution of the action. Even strides that aren’t the biggest or loudest are still strides made. </p><p>He’s so deeply lost in thought that he doesn’t hear his name being called until what must be the sixth time at least, and he’s so startled by the unexpected sound that he turns on a heel without thinking and goes falling off the topmost metal rung, breath knocked out of his lungs as he hits the ground hard and feels the impact on his exposed skin immediately. </p><p>The screen door slams shut.</p><p>“Oh, shit, Eds!” Richie shouts, and he runs over to where Eddie has fallen onto the stone garden steps, hissing painfully as blood blooms red and hot from his knee. “Shit, fuck, are you okay?”</p><p><em> NO! </em> Eddie wants to scream, finally, just tear his fucking hair out. <em> I’m not okay! I’m tired and I’m unmarried and my knee fucking hurts! Fuck! </em></p><p>All he can do is grimace. Richie nods to himself, unsurprised at the lack of verbal response, and hauls himself up with cracking knees and a grimace of his own. He holds out a hand to help haul Eddie up and guide him over to lean against the wall. </p><p>“Hold tight,” he says. “I’m going to get you some bandages for that.”</p><p>So Eddie does, tilting his head back and closing his eyes as he breathes in deep and berates himself for being so careless, so obvious with his preoccupations. He wishes he were Richie and felt up for spinning this into a joke about falling so hard for him, but instead he just feels vaguely apprehensive and a bit defeated. </p><p>It doesn’t take more than a minute for Richie to get back, probably because despite his progress he still keeps a couple first aid kits around the house for easy grabbing in case of emergency. He doesn’t feel bad about that one. Richie is a walking emergency, and it’s his job to be prepared for all eventualities. </p><p>He’s kept to his word, though, not moving from his spot propped against the wall, so Richie just flashes him a smile and kneels, wet cloth in hand to swipe gently at the torn skin.</p><p>But it looks like he’s not willing to patch him up in silence, this time.</p><p>“You wanna tell me what’s been bothering you so much lately, space-case?” Richie asks gently, almost absently as he bandages up Eddie’s torn knee. His tongue is even sticking out a little between his teeth, so great is his concentration.  </p><p>Eddie’s heart sinks. He should have known better than to think Richie wouldn't notice his strange behaviour, knowing him as well as he does for as long as he has, interim years notwithstanding. He’s been so caught up in the particulars of how and why he shouldn’t be thinking of his best friend like that that he hadn’t stopped to consider he might not get the chance to prepare his explanation first, before his oldest, dearest secret is pulled out of him. </p><p>He takes a deep breath in, fully intending to let the words out, but it’s as if his throat is frozen again, like he couldn’t get the words out even if he wanted to. He’s not even sick this time.</p><p><em> I want to marry you, </em>he thinks, words pounding in his head even as his mouth refuses to cooperate, wishing Richie could just read his thoughts. <em> I’m sorry. But I do. And I’m not brave enough to tell you. </em></p><p>If he loved him less, he might be able to talk about it more. Whoever said that was right. </p><p>Richie waits, but still no words emerge. So he hums thoughtfully. “You’ve been… kinda off for awhile now. Maybe even a couple of months.” </p><p>And as he peeks up at Eddie expectantly from his place on the ground, something about the position jolts a long-forgotten memory from the banks of his mind, a younger and messier, though still laughing and kind Richie patching up the same knee that day on the playground, sunshine bright and their whole lives still ahead of them. </p><p>Not privy to his innermost thoughts, Richie visibly begins to wilt, doubt crossing his face like a shadow. </p><p>“Is it...Eddie, if you don’t want to live here with me anymore, you know I’d never..” Richie trails off, not seeming to know how to end the sentence, which is good - Eddie thinks it’s a laughable concept to even entertain, and he doesn’t want Richie to either. </p><p>But his heart hasn’t yet stopped pounding, and Richie is still saying something to him, but he can’t hear it over the thunderous rushing in his ears.</p><p>Thirty-five years in the making. It’s now or never. He’ll never get a moment like this again, right?</p><p>Right?</p><p>“Kiss it better.” Eddie blurts out gracelessly, finally. He winces at the tactless delivery, but doesn’t take it back. “Please.”</p><p>Richie freezes from his place on the floor, hands still wrapped carefully around the knobby bones of his knee. There’s a distant look in his eyes, as if he’s remembering the same thing Eddie only just had, and Eddie outright aches to know how it looks from his eyes, that first meeting of theirs. If he had felt that same sharp tug in his chest that said it was something that was meant to have happened, that it was perfectly right that the two of them should always have found each other. </p><p>“...Eddie. What did you say?” Richie asks, head still bowed and shoulders tense, looking studiously at the wound on his knee. </p><p>“I said,” Eddie clears his throat and forces himself to raise his chin, to not let his voice waver. “Kiss it better. Please.”</p><p>Richie’s voice when he speaks again is quiet and wary, but he completes the pattern, always reliable, even if this time they’ve gone in reverse. “But we’re not married.”</p><p>“You said-” Eddie clears his throat, nerves slowly being overtaken by a growing sense of surety. Richie’s never once in their lives left him wondering where the two of them stand, and he hopes to God he doesn’t start now. “You said someday. Remember? We - we promised.”</p><p>And then, to Eddie’s great alarm, Richie’s eyes begin to fill with tears.</p><p>“Rich-” Eddie says alarmed, reaching out to him, ready to apologize, but Richie is already waving him away, laughing wetly through the hands he’d just brought up to cover his face. </p><p>“No, it’s - I’m not upset, I swear,” he says. “I’m just - I never knew that you remembered that. Or that, um. That that was ever actually on the table.”</p><p>Oh. </p><p>“Well,” Eddie says carefully. “I don’t accept marriage proposals from just anyone, you know. If Bill had asked me in kindergarten, I would’ve just chucked a block at his head.”</p><p>A cricket chirps somewhere in the uncut grass of their yard, and a gentle wind blows the scent of the pervasive wildflowers towards where the pair of them wait, staring at each other like two wild animals caught on the highway in oncoming headlights. </p><p>“And I’ve been trying to ask you for so fucking <em> long</em>,” he adds after a moment, wincing at the whine in his voice.</p><p>It almost feels like the very air is stood still, waiting on their every breath to break and release the flood.</p><p>“Uh,” Richie breathes in deep and slaps his hands down on his thighs to rid himself of some of the nervous energy hanging off of him like an oversized jacket. “Yeah, that’s - okay. Okay. So you - planned this out then, huh?”</p><p>“For <em> so long</em>, Richie.”</p><p>“Without even a ring, though, Eds?” Richie asks playfully then, settling into himself and grin widening the longer this goes on without anybody jumping out from the bushes to yell <em> sike! </em> at him. “Just what kind of man do you take me for, exactly?”</p><p>But now that there’s even a glimmer of hope on the horizon, Eddie is already jumping up before Richie can finish his faux-complaint, zipping through the backdoor and into the upstairs bedroom and back before Richie can even ask him where he was going. </p><p>Doesn’t matter though. Richie always lets him run.</p><p>“I <em> do </em> have a ring, actually,” he says triumphantly, small velvet box clenched in his hand, and he brings it out forward in front of him to show a stunned Richie. “Dickhead. Don’t ever imply I come unprepared again.”</p><p>“You - I-” Richie splutters, shocked completely speechless for once in his life, staring rapidly back and forth between Eddie’s face and the black box. He doesn’t even make the obvious joke. “Holy shit, Eds, <em> what</em>? <em> When?</em>”</p><p>Ah. There’s the catch. </p><p>“Uhh,” Eddie flounders. He’d been so caught up in the euphoria of surprising Richie with all of his forethought that he’d forgotten how deeply potentially embarrassing the answer to that question was always bound to be. “Like. Months ago.”</p><p>“Eddie, we’ve only <em> known </em> each other again for a few months.” Richie says weakly. </p><p>“Yeah, and I was already trying to figure out how to get you to marry me back at the Jade,” Eddie snaps defensively, even though he knows Richie isn’t - hasn’t - probably (?) won’t ever make fun of him for it. “So.”</p><p>“You were-” Richie seems completely lost for words, looking around the yard as if he’ll find any answers there about how and why this has become his reality. He shakes his head as if to clear that train of thought, and then says: “So you. You picked out a ring for me?”</p><p>Eddie takes a deep breath. <em> Now </em> this is it. The real moment of truth. Amongst other things, whatever happens here, after today he won’t have to worry about whether or not Richie will like the ring he picked out - whether he should have just gone with his dad’s classic old one, after all, or whether Richie will just say he doesn’t want either one of them, actually, thanks, you goddamn freak. </p><p>“Yeah, I - I didn’t want to use my dad’s old one,” he starts to explain, kneeling down in front of Richie, who is also kneeling, still in shock. It’s not exactly the traditional way of doing things, position-wise, but he doesn’t think they were ever going to be traditional anway. When he flips open the lid of the box to show Richie the band inside, warm gold with a small green gem sticking out of the top, the pressure of the resulting silence is too much, and he starts to babble just to fill the empty space. “Because, you know, my parents’ marriage was a mess and I don’t want ours to be anywhere near that. If you want to marry me, I mean. And, like, I know I didn’t ask you what kind of ring you’d want or like, but how could I do that anyway without spoiling the whole point of the surprise, you know. And - and -”</p><p>“Okay, breathe, Eds,” Richie interrupts, reaching up to capture his hands and tug them down to intertwine with his own. “I’m sure I’ll love it. Okay? I’m, like - certain of that, actually.”</p><p>When Eddie nods back, heart pounding, he smiles at him reassuringly. “Alright, so come on, then, pal. Put it on me.” </p><p>And Eddie reaches to do so, but something occurs to him in the split second between, something about that name rankling to him, and he doesn’t want any more misunderstandings to exist between them. Not now that they’ve finally made it here. </p><p>“I mean - okay, but you know this isn’t for, like, practical tax reasons or anything right?” he warns, velvet box in his hand held aloft and away as if Richie will suddenly snap forward and grab it, driven purely by dreams of their combined financial security. “I don’t want to marry you just to make you my emergency contact. This is for love reasons.” </p><p>Richie’s mouth had been tremulously threatening to smile for the past thirty seconds of this caveat, but the last sentence seems to hit him like a punch to the face.</p><p>“I’m planning on responding for love reasons, Eds,” he replies weakly. </p><p>So with shaking hands, Eddie carefully removes the band from the little hollow in the cushion. Reaching forward to slide the cold metal over Richie’s warm and unwavering hand slots something into place in his chest that feels like it's been broken and missing for decades. </p><p>There is an awestruck look on Richie’s face when he splays his hand out to study the ring on his finger. He looks like everything he’s ever wanted in his forty years of life has just been handed to him on a silver platter, when he hadn’t even known he was allowed to ask for anything at all. As promising as this is, Eddie’s feeling the need to fill the silence with his own rambling again, not so much out of fear this time, but - just, too much emotion.  </p><p>“And I even thought once that we could, like, tattoo underneath them too, you know, like if they got lost or broken or something,” Eddie rambles, hands flying wildly in the air around him again as he gestures nervously. They are no longer containable. “Because it’s more permanent, you know, and that’s - that’s how I feel about it. But I figured I’d definitely have to wait for you for that one. We could get it done together. Or, like, you might hate that idea, too, and then we wouldn’t have to do it, of course. Which would be okay, obviously.”</p><p>“You put so much thought into this,” Richie murmurs wonderingly, almost to himself. “You neurotic beauty.”</p><p>“Yeah - actually, yeah, fuck you, I have a bone to pick with you about that,” Eddie ramps up again, stabbing a finger accusingly into his patterned chest. “You know, this whole time I was trying to show you how good I’d be to you if you ever let me be your husband, but all you kept doing was showing off how good of a husband you <em> already were without knowing it, </em>which was fucking frustrating, Richard!”</p><p>That seems to be the final straw for Richie, who starts to laugh hysterically at the outraged accusation, and Eddie thwacks him on the shoulder, still shouting but laughing himself now, too. </p><p>“Stop that! It’s not funny!” he laughs helplessly, falling forward onto Richie, who catches him easy around the waist, still wheezing. “You’re going to be such a mean husband to me.”</p><p>Richie’s eyes as he looks up to face Eddie are warm and happy. “<em>Oh, </em>I am definitely accepting your proposal, then?” </p><p>Eddie’s face falls swiftly. “Are you - are you not?”</p><p>It occurs to him then that he hadn’t yet actually asked Richie what exactly his feelings were towards him.</p><p>And even though he was the one to make the joke in the first place, the very thought seems to cause a glitch in Richie’s brain, mouth spluttering open and shut as he tries to reconcile a world where they have each other with a world in which he would ever, ever say no to that particular question.</p><p>Eddie has been so brave this whole time, swallowing his fears and anxieties and having the nerve to ask Richie that question. Time to be brave back. </p><p>Richie swallows thickly. And what he says back isn’t a simple “Yes” and it isn’t “Are you fucking crazy, how could I ever say no?” and he doesn’t say “Do you think we even need to do that; is it really a necessary legality for two people who are already bound so tightly, body, mind, and soul?” like Eddie himself has also found himself thinking from time to time.</p><p>No, instead what he says is, “I’ve only been waiting for you to ask me.” </p><p>“Oh.” Eddie says. “How long?”</p><p>“Since the very first time I kissed you better when we were five, and we promised each other that we’d always end up here,” Richie says, laughing through his renewed tears. “You could have asked me at any time in my whole life since that point, Eds, and I always would have said yes. I was just waiting for you to catch up.”</p><p>“I’m here now,” Eddie says, knocking their foreheads together and not pulling away after he laughs at the action, eyes closed. “I’ve <em> been </em> here, Rich, I promise. I just wasn’t ready to be brave yet.”</p><p>For a moment, they breathe in the same air. It’s almost a perfect moment, but for the tense, anticipatory vibrating that is growing steadily more palpable the longer they sit there without resolution. </p><p>“Will you ask me now?” Richie finally pleads, breaking the silence as his voice breaks too, patience noticeably frayed now that Eddie knows they’ve really been on the same page all along. “Please?”</p><p>And Eddie doesn’t say “Please, please, I’ve been waiting to be your husband since the very first moment I saw you,” and he doesn’t say “Can I please be <em> your </em> wife guy, Richie, your husband guy?”, and he doesn’t say, “I feel in my heart and in my soul like I’ve been married to you for years already,” like he really wants to and like he really feels. </p><p>No, he keeps it short and simple. Instead what he says is, “Alright. Richie, will you marry me?”</p><p>The sun sets blue and purple over the distant Californian hills, and a smile breaks over the landscape of Richie’s face like melting ice atop a pond at the close of Winter, like the way his heart had cracked open in that gloomy restaurant synchronous with the sudden striking of a gong, like the way the glass will smash under Richie’s foot at their own wedding. </p><p>“Yeah, Eds,” Richie says, those hands, always those hands, reaching out to tug Eddie’s face to his own to press their mouths together such that his last words are muffled, not that it matters - Eddie can understand him. “I’ll marry you.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>i wrote and posted this even though i already have 3-4 other longform reddie fics in the works🥴.  ok.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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